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Last night, Speaker Pelosi wrote a blog post on her website about the House health care bill from the Tri-Committee staff that showed it as being deficit neutral and that it would yield a $6 billion surplus. This is huge news because it cuts off arguments from so-called "fiscal conservatives" like moderate Democrats, Republicans, and Blue Dog Democrats that the current House health bill isn’t deficit-neutral. Here’s the relevant excerpt in the press release about the $6 billion surplus from the Tri-Committee staff on the Energy and Commerce Committee website below:
"The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released estimates this evening confirming for the first time that H.R. 3200, America’s Affordable Health Choices Act, is deficit neutral over the 10-year budget window – and even produces a $6 billion surplus…The estimates also cover important reinvestments in Medicare and Medicaid, including phasing in the closing of the "donut" hole in the Medicare drug benefit. The bill’s long-term reform of Medicare’s physician fee schedule to eliminate the potential 21 percent cut in fees, and put payments on a sustainable basis for the future, will cost about $245 billion. Those costs, however, are not included in the net calculations above, as they will be absorbed under the upcoming statutory ‘pay go’ legislation that is pending in the House."
If there are those who are wondering about the current difference in the CBO report that shows the House health care legislation adding $239 billion to the deficit, it’s because the pay-go legislation which would strike this difference hasn’t been passed yet. The Tri-Committee staff is basing their calculations of the $6 billion surplus contingent on the passage of the pay-go legislation. So until the pay-go legislation is passed, the $245 billion which is being carved out from the pay-go legislation won’t be compared against the CBO projected addition of $239 billion to the national deficit in the House legislation. Once the pay-go legislation is passed then the $245 billion carved out from the pay-go will be compared against the $239 billion to the deficit to produce an overall $6 billion surplus.
The pay-go legislation, H.R. 2920, by Rep. Steny Hoyer will be scheduled for a vote this week on July 21st at 3PM in the House Rules Committee for full consideration to be introduced onto the House floor. Here’s more from CQ Politics on what will happen when that pay-go legislation is introduced:
When that bill (HR 2920) is considered in the next week, the house budget chairman will be allowed to change the budget rules so that the physician payment section of the health bill does not violate “Pay Go.”
If they succeed in changing the budget rules and passing the pay-go legislation, then the CBO will have to revise their estimate and declare the legislation to be deficit-neutral. It’s going to be one hell of a fight this week.
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Thanks slinker!
I think this is a huge point and I think it’s an issue we can win on.
Health insurance oligopoly doesn’t sell insurance. They skim the most profitable revenue away from the healthiest and youngest Americans. They let the tax payers insure everyone else through Medicare and Medicaid. It’s a classic case of socializing losses and privatizing profits. Worse, health insurance oligopoly has tilted the incentives away from preventitive health care.
OT, pro-health insurance oligopoly ads here in Wisconsin are targeting physician choice. This could also be a very good issue for us. A lot of people with private insurance lose their provider when he switches carriers.
Medicare’s administrative costs are around 3%. The administrative costs of private health insurance are around 20%. Sounds like the CBO found that 17%. Those funds should go to those who really provide patient care.
Thanks for commenting! You’re right. It is an issue that we can win on.
Since he’s a Blue Dog obstructionist this isn’t totally off topic:
Electoral-vote.com has fundraising data for “vulnerable” congresspeople in its July 18 post.
Representative District PVI Raised Spent Cash on Hand
Baron Hill IN-09 R+6 $481K $81K $402K
Hill should respond to advertising on a public plan. If the deficit neutrality is part of the advertising it could even help him… not that that’s an outcome I’d be particularly happy about. He was pushed to switch on SCHIP due to work firepups did. Let’s do it again.
Hey Slinkerwink,
There is a new WAPO article (President Is Set to ‘Take the Baton’) linked through the home page of Huffington Post, titled “Now it’s Personal – White House launches new strategy (All Obama, All the Time).
The crux of the article is President Obama is going full-force the next two weeks in campaign mode to accomplish Health Care. Axelrod said “Now’s that time.” and the president will have intense private meetings and multiple public meetings.
In addition, Gov. Switzer from Montana proved to be quite stupid with his complaint about the Health Care bill at the RGA as opposed to talking behind the scenes to voice his concerns about Medicaid.
Just FYI – I hope it is useful.
Thanks! looks like your tireless efforts are paying off!
Can we really believe Pelosi?
I think not.
Got proof? C’mon, share it with us.
Indeed they are.
I’ve been using Slink’s diaries as ammo.
Health care {{{WOO HOO}}}…insurance cos suck this!
and this is something we really must address before that surplus is realized
as I noted on my diary, the republicans will take that surplus as they took the social security surplus and they will use it to fund tax gifts for the wealthy
this is a fact, they WILL do that
we MUST create the locked box that was never realized under the incredibly efficient and succesful social security program
we must create that locked box and then do whatever is neccessary to reclaim the assets taken from social security in their depraved redistribution of wealth from those who create the wealth to those who profit off of it
I don’t care about pay-go. I don’t care about deficits, hell, we’re paying for banks. I Want Health Care.
I don’t mind pay go as long as it’s done after we get our money back, the assets given to the wealthy in their “tax deductions equal stimulous” bull shit
I want my money back, then they can have their “pay go”
“Last night, Speaker Pelosi wrote a blog post on her website about the House health care bill from the Tri-Committee staff that showed it as being deficit neutral and that it would yield a $6 billion surplus.”
You have to be a complete dumbass to believe this story. You libs are a bunch of lemmings…
This is not deficit neutral or a surplus. The healthcare will raise taxes for EVERYONE, even the mid to lower class that you dems pretend to care about.
As usual the goopes are using lies, half-truths and obfuscation… we should be used to it by now.
Dems need a full-time “framing” department who shoots back automatically at their BS… trouble is … getting it past the blood-brain barrier, eg the MSM to the American people.
Kennedy in Newsweek today lays out a long compelling narrative about health are…
Obama’s hitting it hard… we are on the ground spreading the word and making phone calls…
Maybe we can penetrate the Repub/corporate lying din… this is truly a test of our democracy… if we lose this one, it’s all over.
We are a vast, populous, wealthy country. If we all pool our resources we can certainly pay for health care with no tax for the very poor, minimal tax for the middle class, and a higher tax for the wealthy.
If Canada and France can figure out how to do this, we sure as hell can.
Of course to make it deficit neutral we can always raise taxes.
I know – Republicans and other nutjobs nearly blow an aneurysm at the thought, but if you consider how much we shell out out-of-pocket now, you can raise my taxes by $1,000 a year or more and I’ll still be coming out ahead if I don’t have to give that money to the big insurance companies.
Then again, if we went to national single-payer we could probably provide more and better care without increasing spending a bit due to the savings from getting the profit motive out of our health care system.
frederic, as usual, republicans invented the term ”fuzzy math”, and just like those who said there would be no surplus with social security, as usual they were wrong then, and wrong of course now
contrary to populist neo con talking points, public programs just about always costs each of us FAR less then the same thing run privately
however, republucans first market how ”wasteful” that ”500 dollar hammer” is, then they take a billion dollar golden parachute which FAR out distances the waste of a 500 dollar hammer
IN ADDITION
those working for the government are payed a living wage, those underlings in private industry have to use public service just to survive
but keep with your talking points, if you are not wealthy then they have convinced you to argue against your own children
proud of yourself?
if you are wealthy then I have to give you credit for trying to talk to us as if we are morons
troll=fed, off to work
I know this is not politically viable, but I think it important to keep that provision that gives poor women access to abortions.
If only to stick to that Jackass Rep. Tiahrt for his comments implying that Obama’s mother may have aborted him if abortions were free.
Here is a clip if you have not already seen it.
http://progressnotcongress.org/?p=2222
Sounds like a gimmick, to me. Pay-go comes and goes at the pleasure of the Congress, hysterically speaking.
slinkerwink I hope it works
My personal view is that Pelosi and Rangel stepped all over what should have been the headline, one that would have avoided all the confusion over Pay-Go. Because the following lede is both unambiguous and totally supportable:
“Friday night CBO released new scoring showing that after considering all spending and revenue changes in HR3200 the ten-year cost has been reduced from a previous and partial estimate of $1.048 trillion to $239 billion for a net change of $809 billion”
A nice big number that could have been readily backed up with a link to the Report and a table extracted from it. Which I did for our blog.
http://angrybear.blogspot.com/…..ittee.html
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_fjW7…..+score.jpg
Then if you liked you could have followed it up with something like this:
“Speaker Pelosi and Chairman Rangel also reported that pending legislation rectifying Medicare scoring will produce additional projected deficit savings of $245 billion over that 10 year time frame for a net change in deficit scoring of -$6 billion, the equivalent of a $6 billion surplus”
As it is people are thinking this is some sort of a cash surplus compared to the status quo, something that just isn’t so.
Deficit neutral? Absolutely, and a very fine and supportable talking point. Produces a surplus? Well kinda, once you qualify a few things and muddy the waters, you get $6 billion out the other end. I am just saying I would have stayed with the clarity.
If Pelosi says it, it can’t be true.
A guy called into Howie Carr’s show today (Howie is a right winger out of Boston, MA) to say that his company pays $12,000,000 a year for medical insurance and the fill-in for Howie this week asked how many employees are at this company. He said, “1100″ and then was cut off from speaking further.
And how ’bout all those republican amendments to Obama’s bill…
http://www.slate.com/id/2223023/
I feel the same way. It’s quite clear that objections to deficits only occur in relation to legislation that someone opposes or doesn’t care too much about. We never worry very much when it comes to paying for the two wars, or when it came to bailing out the financial system. But during the stimulus debate we had to give up 50% of the stimulus due to deficit concerns, and now health care, education, further energy legislation, and anything else will have to be deficit neutral and subject to “paygo” standards.
These budget concerns are ridiculous, and are based on concerns and theories that have been outmoded since Keynes wrote in the 1930s. Democrats bought into these theories during the late 70s and early 80s under the influence of people like Paul Volcker and Alice Rivlin. Them during the 90s they became the party of the balanced budget, caring more about budget balancing than they did about investing in human capital.
The national debt will begin to decrease, once again, if we end the depression, create a growing economy, re-create an income tax system which requires those doing very well to pay their fair share, and reinstitute wealth and reasonable inheritance taxes. In the mean time, if the Blue Dogs, ConservaDems, and Republicans really care so much about deficits, let’s see them raise those taxes on the wealthy, cut expenditures for the wars, and reduce appropriations for the Defense Department. The money they’re worried about can easily be found there. In the end this is a matter of priorities. And what they are really telling us that they think health care for other people apart from themselves is not very important. Well, we know what the answer is to that. It is to defeat them and elect new representatives and Senators who will vote for our priority, and keep doing it until we get the reps and Senators we need. Make health care the only priority until they pass it.
Sorry Frederic. I don’t care whether it’s deficit neutral. it’s necessary. Also, taxes on those with high incomes will go up, whatever happens. We can’t sustain the tax structure you guys gave us that have led to ruinous deficits over the years. Rich folks are just going to have be patriotic enough to pay their fair share. But take heart the country prospered under marginal tax rates that were far higher than today’s through all of the post-war period right up to the Reagan Administration. And even Reagan had those tax rates at 50%. Tell you what. Let’s raise marginal tax rates up to 50% again for those making over $1,000,000 per year, and up to 45% for those making over 45% and leave the rest of the tax structure where it will be when the Bush tax cuts expire. That should take care of any deficits arising out of health care without raising taxes for anyone else’s taxes.